


Stay

by 221b_hound



Series: Guitar Man [24]
Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Angst, Friendship, Gen, References to Suicide, Suicide, please stay
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-11-12
Updated: 2012-11-12
Packaged: 2017-11-18 11:42:59
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,040
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/560696
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/221b_hound/pseuds/221b_hound
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>WARNING: Off-screen suicide; discussion of suicide; sadness and angst.</p><p>This weekend, a friend of mine attempted suicide. I wish I knew how to help him. I wish the things that plague him could be made to go away, to leave him be. He's a good man. He deserves better.</p><p>I wrote this, anyway. Just me trying to process it, I suppose.</p><p>Everyone out there. I know I don't know you very well. I know there are things about your lives I'll never know. But please. Even if whatever haunts you seems too hard to bear. Please stay with us. Please. Find someone to talk to. A friend, even those online ones who may not have met your body. We've met your mind. You matter.  You're loved, even if you think you are too broken to love. You are loved.</p><p>Remember the winter comes around all the time, but so does the spring. It does. Please stay.</p><p>Please stay.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Stay

**Author's Note:**

> One of my readers was inspired to write a song based on this story. [Here is _Stay With Me_ on Soundcloud.](https://soundcloud.com/katherine-fow/stay-with-me)

**Stay**

Just an ordinary day in London. An ordinary day in Baker Street. A bit too ordinary, maybe. No cases. Nothing much to do. Sherlock was bored, but John pulled an unfinished song out of his folder, played around with the chords a little, asked Sherlock _what the hell is wrong with this bridge, because it’s just not working?_ and _why can’t I think of a phrase that bloody well scans for that last verse?_

John’s phone rings, so John leaves Sherlock and his violin, who together are making a much better job of that bridge, and he takes the call.

John doesn’t say much. He is very still and very quiet while he listens, then he asks if there is anything he can do _. Is there anything that you need?_ he says. And he says: _I’ll be there. Yes. I’m so sorry._

And he stands there, the phone in his hand, staring at it, but not really. He mind is far away, and he is seeing something that’s lost now. Lost forever.

Sherlock’s bow halts mid-stroke and Sherlock watches John. For a full minute, and John doesn’t move, and Sherlock quietly lowers the bow, the violin.

“An army friend,” says Sherlock.

John blinks, looks at him. “Yes. Derek. You met him at the pub last month, remember?”

Sherlock nods. He remembers. Derek. The troubled one. Plagued by nightmares and anxiety and rage, and flinching at loud noises. Also intelligent and funny. Excellent voice, judging by his performance at the pub karaoke.  

 I haven’t… hadn’t seen him for a few weeks. I thought he was doing all right. He said he was doing all right.” John’s next breath is sharp and hard, and he holds it for a moment before replying. “He wasn’t.”

Sherlock considers his next words carefully. (In the past, in their first year, Sherlock wouldn’t have been so thoughtful, but the world has changed and he has changed, so now, for John, he considers.)

“His suicide is not your fault, John.”

Perhaps he didn’t consider that long enough, because John’s next look is angry. And then it isn’t. “I know. I tried. I tried to be there for him to talk to. He seemed… better lately. Getting better. Coping. But something… I guess something took him back down. Maybe he thought it was never going to get better, ever. Maybe…” John shakes his head. “It never will now. There’ll never be that chance for it to get better now.”

John takes another sharp, hard breath, holds it, exhales slowly. John’s eyes are downcast. He is looking at his own hands.

He says nothing. Sherlock says nothing, but he doesn’t take his eyes off John. He knows what John is thinking about. Death. Suicide. John’s own gun. A time before Sherlock. Not after St Bart’s no. John never contemplated it then, not once.  But Sherlock’s been to the dark himself, in times before John. He doesn’t think he should tell John this. But John was there, when the cabbie set his challenge. John already knows about Sherlock and the dark.

“It can, you know,” says John at last. “It can get better. Even when you’re convinced it never will be.”

Sherlock can hear the tremor in John’s voice. John, who never cries.

“John.”

John looks up to meet Sherlock’s eyes, then. “If I’d given in, the first time, the second time. The third. The seventh. The twentieth. All those times everything felt so futile. If I’d given in to thinking it would never get better, I wouldn’t be here now. I wouldn’t have this.” A vague twitch of his fingers is the tiniest reflection of what he means. _All this. Baker street. You. This life. This life of ours._

“Yes,” Sherlock agrees, “It can.” _You nearly didn’t stay, but you did. You stayed and you found me_. _You made me stay too._

John is blinking rapidly at him now, as though that will keep the burning in his eyes at bay. “You wouldn’t ever… I know it’s not like that now. I know that. St Bart’s was a fake. Hope’s pill was… not really a death wish. I know that. I know. But. Please. You wouldn’t ever…. go. You wouldn’t go, would you? Not without coming to me. Not without talking to me. You wouldn’t do that.”

“No, John, I wouldn’t do that.”

“Promise me.”

“I promise you, John.”

“Don’t go. Don’t ever go away like that.”

John and Sherlock have a casual affection, these days. They stick their feet all over each other on the sofa, they wrestle for sheet music that John doesn’t want to share, they lean on each other’s shoulders and they have, more than once, bundled up uncomfortably close in a cupboard while on a case. They don’t tend to hug each other much. The grins they give each other serve that function pretty well most of the time.

But on this ordinary, terrible day, Sherlock closes the distance between them. He wraps one large, long-fingered hand around the back of John’s neck and pulls him close. Presses his forehead to John’s, and his other hand is wrapped around John’s back.

And John leans into him, his hands clenched in Sherlock’s shirt, and with their foreheads pressed together, each feels the other’s breath on his face. The breath that means _he stayed, he stayed, when he could have gone, he stayed._

“I will never go away like that, John.”

“Good.”

“You, too. You have to stay.”

“I don’t think like that anymore. I haven’t in a long time.”

“Nor I. But still. Promise.”

“I promise,” agrees John.

“I am sorry about your friend,” says Sherlock.

“Me too.”

Reluctantly, they let each other go.

“Can I do anything to help?” asks Sherlock. He know there isn’t, really. But he has learned that saying it is a kind of help. Saying it is saying _You are not alone._

John nods, though. He summons a smile. “Play for me. Something… hopeful.”

Sherlock picks up his violin and his bow, and he plays Vivaldi’s Spring, because he knows John likes it; because spring always carries hope with it. Life after the cold, and though the cold will come again, so will the spring, again. Again and always.

  
  


 


End file.
